DIY Pallet Photobooth.

I'm getting married in a month or so and my fiancee and I want a photobooth, but renting them costs many hundreds of dollars for a few hours of service, when you add in travel time... it was just downright obscene (note- we live in San Francisco where life is just ridiculously expensive to begin with).

So in continuing with my love of pallet wood projects (free rustic looking wood!!!) I decided to make a photobooth encasement... my main objective was to make a system that guests can't actual access... no mouse/keyboard to play with, just a single click of a button and it's off and running.  I will be use Breeze System Remote Pro software which is a pretty nifty program-- it allows a live view of the camera viewfinder to be posted on the screen, you can program how many pics you want it to take, how much delay between shots, customize the background.  We opted to skip the printer but if you want to print you can choose your layout... We figured it would be easier and cheaper just post the pics to our wedding website.  

As for the box, it was ridiculously simple-- a few cuts of the miter saw, a couple cuts with the jigsaw, some nails, a bunch of screws and voila...  I made the dimensions work with an old 17" iMac I'm borrowing from a friend.  I didn't even really bother measuring just made an initially cut that looked good then just duplicated it. I'm guessing it's a bit under 2 feet wide, 8 inches deep and probably 2 feet tall.  There is a supported shelf on the bottom to hold the monitor and a thin plywood shelf to hold the camera (I screwed a 1/4" bolt into another piece of wood to act as my tripod... just to keep the camera from moving).  I pondered ordering a USB trigger button but they run like $50-75 and I couldn't justify that cost, so instead I ordered an arcade style button ($2) and jerry-rigged a system so you push the button and it will trigger a hidden mouse (the software can be initiated with a click).  

I opted against a full enclosure as we'll have it outside so we'll hang a couple sheets around and be done with it.  

Now I just have to figure out how to best light the area... a figure a couple continuous lights and anybody have a speedlite I can borrown :)